Council on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion

The Council’s Charge

The following four principal responsibilities, drafted by the President’s Task Force on Diversity in April 2016, charge the Council on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion with the following:

Expanding the dialogue about diversity, inclusion, and equity to include the entire Barnard community of students, faculty, staff, and alumnae.

Promoting and coordinating campus-wide participation in the College’s diversity and inclusion efforts.

Managing and monitoring the implementation of recommendations from the President’s Task Force on Diversity and Inclusion.

Advising Barnard’s senior leadership and Board of Trustees on ongoing and new initiatives that create a more diverse and inclusive campus community.

Prioritized Goals for 2018-19

Expanding the dialogue about diversity, inclusion, and equity: The Council will concentrate early efforts on input and outreach to the larger Barnard community. It is tasked with understanding how the College can best support all members of the campus community and promote the representativeness of the student body, faculty, and staff. Following from this, the Council will develop strategies for communicating its findings to the broader community, along with providing timely information about relevant campus-wide activities.

Creating a structure for reviewing proposals from the community: The Council will articulate a structure, timeline, and budget for evaluating proposals for campus-wide initiatives for enhancing diversity and inclusion coming from students, faculty, staff, and alumnae, including the criteria for accepting proposals, and the scale and timing of events on campus. Leveraging its reach to all community constituents, the Council will prioritize initiatives or proposals that reflect the desires of the Barnard community most broadly.

Organizing campus-wide events: The Council will develop a plan (including timeline, budget, potential speakers, themes, and structure) for two connected events to be organized each year, including an annual “Grace Lee Boggs Lecture” and a cultural event, that are accessible to all members of the community. At a minimum, the Council will organize an inaugural event for spring 2019 and a second event for fall 2019.

Membership

The council is chaired by Ariana González Stokas, Vice President for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, and members who include students, faculty members, exempt and nonexempt staff, alumnae, trustees, and an ex officio member from the President’s staff.